Archivo de la etiqueta: Gangs

In January 2016, the government of Honduras and the Organization of American States (OAS) formalized the creation of a new international organ to help fight corruption in this country. The Mission of Support Against Corruption and Impunity in Honduras (MACCIH, in the Spanish acronym) is a welcome step. However, it is very early to estimate whether it will be able to make a positive contribution to solving the daunting challenges facing justice and security in this country.

Honduras experiences what can be called a “perfect storm” of interrelated problems: violence perpetrated by diverse actors (gangs, drug traffickers); human rights abuses, in the context of a steady militarization of public security; impunity; corruption at the highest institutional levels, and widespread poverty and inequality. For years, it has been the most violent country in the world, with an average rate of 90 homicides per 100,000 people according to estimates by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime and the World Bank, which is significantly higher than the international average intentional homicide rate of 6.2 per 100,000 people.

This article about Honduras was published February 29, 2016, on the website of Sustainable Security. Click here if you wish to read the complete text.

Violence is escalating again in El Salvador. March 2015 was the most violent month in over a decade, and the government is preparing army and police battalions to fight the gangs. These trends mark the definitive end of a process which started in 2012 with a truce between the two main gangs—MS-13 and Barrio 18—and evolved into a more complex and multidimensional approach to reducing violence, with a degree of international support.